


You're Not Real

by isola13



Category: The Poppy War - R. F. Kuang
Genre: F/M, Modern AU, Spoilers for Book 3: The Burning God, TW: Blood, TW: suicidal thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 10:42:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29915694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isola13/pseuds/isola13
Summary: Everything is normal. They're four college students. There is no war. There is no betrayal. There are no gods. There is no Phoenix inside Rin’s mind, and there is no Dragon inside Nezha’s. There are no horrors of Golyn Niis plaguing Kitay and Venka’s mind. Everything is normal.But Nezha—he remembers everything.And he's the only one.
Relationships: Fang Runin/Yin Nezha
Comments: 4
Kudos: 14





	You're Not Real

**Author's Note:**

> The prompt is weird and illogical, but painful so why not? This is for my tpw friends, emma who first encouraged me to read tpw, dani who first gave me the idea for this fic, kiers who gave me the paintball scene, xine who gave me the drinking scene. I hope you enjoy.

It started like this.

With a knife to her chest. 

Nezha felt her die before he saw. Felt the blood splattered on his hands before he saw the glassy shock of her eyes, slightly widened as if surprised that death had finally caught her in the end.

It started like this.

A sudden blackness suddenly enveloping him, blinding him and plunging him away from Speer.

He didn't even have time to open his mouth to scream when he was thrashed against a wall, and light shined his eyes.

"Ow!"

“Nezha!”

"What the fuck?"

He shook his head, rubbing the back of his head that slammed with the impact, and squinted against the light, and squeezed his eyes shut when the world started spinning around him. He fiercely rubbed his eyes, blinked against the ground, and looked up. 

And stopped.

"Kitay?"

His old friend’s face, slightly scrunched in concern, was peering up at him. “Yes, it’s me. At least you seem to know my name.”

Nezha blinked.

"You…I…”

His sight was disoriented. Black spots kept dancing across his view, confusing his thoughts and betraying his senses. As a soldier, trust on his instincts was one of the biggest strengths he relied upon. 

And everything that he was trying to see through betrayed his instincts.

Kitay had been screaming. He’d been in pain. He’d crumpled up on the ground fighting off Rin. 

Now he stood as if he simply shook off all the agony with a swipe of his hand.

“What happened?”

Kitay frowned. “You suddenly stopped and blacked out and hit the wall. Don’t know what, but you recovered pretty quick. At least, on the outside. Was it the all nighter we pulled last night? Although technically, I didn’t need to.”

"I…"

Suddenly everything else filled his vision. First came the sight of a huge architect behind Kitay. Not one but seemingly endless stretch of huge brick walls. Then came the noise. The bustling sound of crowds and the noise that came from the Dirigibles, only a thousand times louder against Nezha's ears. The hard-looking grounds he'd only seen in Hesperian constructions. 

His eyes widened as he took in the surroundings.

This wasn't Speer. This didn't even seem like Nikan at all.

Vertigo swept through Nezha’s head. The moment of adrenaline, the high of the fight with how things had collapsed so quickly was still yet to reel in, and this new piece of bizarre information wasn’t helping.

How does one transport from one place to another?

By death?

Did he die? Did Rin manage to kill him before she died?

_ Rin _ .

"I just… Kitay, what happened?"

“Now I’m certain you’re not okay.” Kitay stared at him, eyes concerned.

Nezha stared back and was stumbled back into the memory of Rin’s eyes staring up at him, driven half-mad by the fire goddess, yet defiant certainty flashing against his weak protests.  _ Fix this. _

He pushed past Kitay, or not Kitay for he wasn't sure how the person who looked like Kitay could be standing there so casually after what happened at Speer mere  _ seconds _ ago, unable to look at him any longer.

Fuck. It was so real, it was real, the moment of catastrophe and Rin and Kitay and the Phoenix and the fiery rage in Rin's eyes, the unbelievable words she spoke, the pull of her hand around his, it was all so fucking real and yet it wasn't here.

He wasn't there. Had he gone mad?

He didn't know where he was, where he was going, or what the fuck this place was. It was all so new, so foreign, so stiff and gray and

so Hesperian.

His legs seemed to know where to bring him. Some kind of force, a guide, a mythical power that pulled him off his world and thrusted him here was controlling him. Guiding him. Nezha didn't know the difference. He only knew he needed to escape, away from this place, and back to Speer? He didn't know where but certainly not here. He couldn't stay here. There were others, people, faces he couldn't recognize that only further paranoid him.

His legs brought him inside a bathroom where it was empty.

Water. He washed and washed and washed but the feel of her blood, though there wasn't any, stayed there with the cold metal sting of his knife. 

His knife. 

His hand fumbled for the knife and found it tucked on his back, hidden from the eyes of the public. Nezha drew and stared at the blood crusted knife, her blood, her fucking blood stained on his blade. A remaining drop slid against the edge and landed on the pool of water, thinly spreading across.

It was real. 

What kind of fucking madness was being pulled here?

Initial shock ebbing away, panic was taking place inside his chest. 

He forced his breathing to slow. Focus. Think. He needed control over here. One. his knife went into Rin’s chest. The evidence was clear on his blade. Two. Some invisible force had wrenched him away from Speer. The Phoenix? The Dragon? Whatever other shit that was clustered up on the Pantheon?

Three. So where the fuck was he?

The place where Kitay seemed safe and unhurt?

Where was Rin?

Where was he?

Were they all dead?

Nezha looked up, saw the mirror and nearly stumbled back in shock.

His face was clean.

Wondrously, he touched his face. He couldn’t feel his scars, but the memory of them was alive on his fingertips. Yet the face inside the mirror was free of any blemish. 

It’s been more than a year since he had gotten the scar, and the lack of it weirdly fascinated Nezha, so much that the desperate, panicking sensation slightly faded away.

The longer he stared at the mirror, the more things he noticed: the obvious being his clothes. It was far from the Dragon uniform he’d adorned and more like the ones the Hesperians wore. His face also didn’t bear any gauntness or tired reminiscence of the war and the experiment. His hair was shorter than he’d let it grow in the past year.

He slowly pushed up his sleeve, which he already noticed lacked the golden rings that made him feel tight, constrained, barely able to breathe for the past few months. The red jarring marks the Hesperians had left were gone, his skin pale and smooth as before. He touched the bare arms as he had his bare face, carefully, as if if he moved too fast, the illusion would break and they would come back, with the pain.

Nezha took a breath.

His gaze kept on flicking back to his right side of the face, as though if he stared long enough, the scars would surface again.

Not even the Dragon had healed those scars. So what had?

What else was possible here?

* * *

Nezha knew he made a big mistake of venturing out the moment he left the bathroom.

He reeled back and hit the wall with his back for the second time for the day. Instinct fueled his body and his hand almost drew the knife out.

"Whoa, what's gotten into you?"

Nezha shook his head, frantic. This wasn't real. "What the fuck?"

"Kitay told me you ran off here." She shrugged. "He had class so he had to go, but thought I'd wait up for you. What took you so long?"

“This isn’t real,” he whispered.

Rin frowned. “What?”

_ You’re not real. _

“I’m…” he swallowed. “What are you doing here?”

Rin stared at him, slightly cocking her head.

“Are you fucked in the head?”

_ I think I am. _

_ You're dead. I killed you. _

"Come on," she said, casually looping her hand around his arm. "Venka's waiting for us, and she said if she had to wait more than five, she would kill us and I'm not putting past her on that."

* * *

Nezha had no idea how he went through the next few days.

His head was caught up in clouds, dazed, shocked by the mere normalcy of this world. He was surprised how quickly he got used to this strange, new, such Hesperian style world but whoever had placed him here seemed to have known he would make an absolute fool of himself if he were dropped here with no prior knowledge. His hands and feet moved before his own thoughts, and whispers echoed through his head.

_ This is what the future looks like. _

_ This is what would’ve been like if all four of you were born a century late. _

_ If things had been different, this would be it. _

This was a world where there was no war, no fight, no burden of legacy or a nation on their shoulders.

Just four college students.

This was a world where they were what they could’ve been. Should’ve been.

  
  


* * *

  
  


It started like this.

With a person he couldn't avoid.

“You’ve been avoiding her.”

Nezha blinked and the room came back into focus.

Staring into empty space wasn't something he needed to be doing. He needed to be looking at the books he had to study, but they were stacked upon, opened in a random page, and he had been looking at them vacantly.  _ What the fuck was Accounting Principles? _ The library was nice, he supposed. It reminded him of the Hesperian architect like the rest of the world but here, the Nikara design was hidden amongst the pillars and the edges. It was an impressively massive building with high ceiling bearing exquisite crisscross design. The summer sunlight streamed through the tall windows, lightning up its path while dust rose to greet its warmth. It illuminated the wooden floors, the glitters of golden edges on book covers, and Kitay's frown directed on him.

Nezha immediately tensed up. Kitay frowning was never a good sign. He was the smartest person Nezha had ever known, and ever would. If something Kitay couldn't solve, Nezha didn't know who could.

The thought sent a wince through his body as he recalled the moment Kitay did fail to recover, the past or the other universe or whatever. He and Rin weren't able to pick themselves back up post-war, as he had predicted.

Not that he felt good about it.

Maybe he did. Maybe some prideful, arrogant ego in him was glad to see them fall.

Wasn't he the one who pushed them toward the edge after all?

He'd always known Rin wouldn't fit to serve the country, only serve the war. Maybe part of him wanted to prove it to her. They were always on the opposite side of the circle, demanding each other's attention and determined to outwit the other.

"Are you listening?"

"Hmm?"

He pulled himself away from the past. Nezha's attention was put short, always gazing at nowhere and lost in thoughts while he shook off others' strange looks. It's been a while since their concerned faces were directed at him. It was more eerie than comforting.

His mind was stuck somewhere between the two worlds, and he had no idea how to handle the incongruity of the two.

After a split second, Kitay's words finally pushed themselves into Nezha's brain.

"Why are you avoiding her?"

Nezha turned his face away.

It was true, why lie? Out of all of them, her face was the most painful to see. He’d seen it in every scope: anger, fear, loss, trust, betrayed.

But the innocent face that had yet faced the horrors of the world, Nezha couldn’t handle.

The vast gap between them that had kept on getting deeper and larger as the war went on existed only for him, and Rin's utter casual leap over the gap unnerved him. Such as pulling his arm along, stealing his food, and telling him to fuck off.

He could barely remember where he stood with her.

Kitay sighed.

"Me and Venka are fucking tired of seeing you two skirt around and still pretend to hate each other. I think everyone knows except you two. Do me a favor, just tell her how you feel and make her stop complaining about you to me every minute of every fucking day?" 

“I… shut up.”

He gave him a look. It was the all-knowing, smart strategic Chen Kitay look and Nezha wished more than anything that he could explain what was happening to him, just so Kitay might come up with the perfect answer. 

But who the fuck would ever believe him?

"Make a move before the chance slips away. You only have one life, Nezha."

  
  


* * *

_ You’re not real. _

It was the mantra that he kept repeating to himself, or he would lose his mind. This was a dream, this was a dream, this was a dream. You’re not real, this wasn’t real, this Kitay was not real, this Venka was not real, this Rin was not real, this world was not real. 

What’s real was Speer, the bloody battle, the god in his mind, the god in hers, Dirigibles flying and falling into the sea, and the knife in his hand. What’s real was that he was dreaming, and the faster he got out, the better.

_ You’re not real. _

Nezha couldn't bear to get attached to something that wasn't real. And dead.

But she felt so real.

And she caught him staring.

Lessons were boring, not unlike the lectures back in Sinegard, but Nezha could hardly care about _ Business Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility  _ he’d apparently taken. The only distraction was Rin, who weirdly took this class with him. She was amazingly committed to college studies, just like she was when they were both students. Her determination and stubbornness was not lost in this world, and with no war or fire to channel it, she poured it into topping the class. During most of the lecture, she kept her head buried under her notes.

That was, until she looked up to find him not concentrating on the lecture at all.

"What?" a smirk crossed across Rin's face as she leaned slightly forward, gently but barely laying her fingers over his. 

Nezha swallowed. 

Oh god. 

This was his Rin in every way: bold, daring, didn't give a fuck. This wasn't his Rin in every way: at peace, relaxed, and gentle. Gentle in a way fire flickered lazily back and forth just because it had no reason to destroy, merely existing and yet still radiating power by drowning everything else in shadows. 

And to be fucking frank, he didn't know how to act around Rin who seemed to genuinely like him and wasn't trying to kill him.

"How did we become friends again?"

"Search me. I still want to kick your ass."

He'd saved her life back in the past. What did he do in this world?

Maybe he wasn't that much of an asshole in this world. This world Nezha didn't have a god invading this mind.

"And why do you still keep me around? My personality?"

Rin raised her eyebrow.

"Yin Nezha, you're nothing but a self centered bitch."

Well.

"Same reason you keep me around, I guess."

His mouth felt dry in ways he'd never felt. This wasn't real. Why did he even care? It felt so real. Maybe he should care. Who knew whether this Rin actually mirrored what Nikara Rin thought. 

Everything left unsaid between them was eating away at his mind.

"Which is?"

Rin's grin was wicked and sharp and ever so the same. "Someone needs to be crazy enough to do it." 

  
  


* * *

“I’m sorry.” he blurted out.

It was a half-assed apology compared to what he really should and should've done, but he couldn't help it.

Venka stopped scrolling on her phone, plugged off her left earphone and frowned. “What for?” 

“I…”

God, why was he so fucking bad? He didn't know what to say to Venka. It's been a whole year since he'd last seen her and he had regretted every single thing that happened.

I'm sorry that I didn't come for you? I'm sorry I didn't give you a chance? I'm sorry I didn't let you fight? I'm sorry it had taken me too long to realize? I'm sorry Rin had to do it for me, what I should've done?

I'm sorry I didn't say it to you, when I should've?

I'm sorry this is the closest way I can apologize to you?

The Venka who was not real?

“Is it about how you ditched me without waking me up after English Communication lecture last week?”

“I―yes.”

“Yin Nezha apologizing, maybe the world  _ is  _ changing.” She slung off her bag and threw it at him. He caught, confused.

“What?”

“Carry that for me for the rest of the day if you’re truly sorry.” Then she skipped ahead to walk with Rin.

* * *

  
  


It started like this.

With a laugh that never seemed to stop.

“We’re doing what now?”

“Paintball!” Venka yelled delightly.

Nezha was extremely confused watching people fire the weapon on each other. He quickly caught up that this was merely a game, a sport that people enjoy without being threatened for their lives or training for an impending war, but the thought didn’t exactly reassure his mind when he picked up the gun, the first time he’d held any weapon since Speer. Except for the knife that always hid on his back.

It resembled the ones the Hesperians carried, and Nezha still wasn't technically comfortable or used to with those.

This body also technically didn't receive years of combat training and he felt it when he tried the limit of his strength. But still, his memory was clear. Where to put his footing, the balance, the aim. The muscles went taut, straining to keep up the spirit with its weaker body.

He aimed the gun and fired.

The paint splashed almost bulls-eye on the center.

The aiming felt quite similar to the bow, although Venka was technically better at it. The crossbow had never been a better weapon for him. But compared to the Hesperian weapons, it was lighter and easier to use.

It took him a while to realize that others were staring at him.

"You," Rin said. "Are surprisingly good at this. That's it, people, I'm here to win, I'm teaming with Nezha."

Kitay rolled his eyes. “You said you’ll team up with me because I’m good at strategy.”

“Well, how was I supposed to know beforehand that Nezha would be superior at paintball of all things?”

"I get the clever boy then," Venka flexed her gun, examining its detail and it so painfully overlapped with the past image of Venka doing the same before the battle of the Red Cliffs that Nezha had to look away. "Don't worry, Kitay, I'm more than certain that they're going to cry in embarrassment when we annihilate them."

“Fuck off,” Rin said brightly.

Nezha almost flinched when she touched his arm. 

“Come on,” she said.

“How does one win in this?”

“First one to get hit is the loser.”

She forced his head onto a mask that covered all his head. They eerily resembled the ones the Federation wore when they spread the gas, and Nezha had to try hard to resist the urge to look in the mirror again, to see whether the scars had resurfaced. 

“We need to go on before they―”

A loud splashed echoed right near Nezha’s face as it squarely hit the boulder beside Rin. She gasped, docked a little too late, and bits of paint smeared over her mask.

“Not hit!” she yelled, and started running. Nezha, still confused over the whole situation, followed her, running even though he cursed this body for lack of stamina that he was used to. 

They stopped, his breathing echoing loudly against the mask. He thought he could hear Kitay and Venka though, having followed them. Their surprise attack, and having the first direct offense gave them so much leverage. He and Rin were hiding and they were hunting them. Siege option was never the best idea, this so early on in a battle.

Nezha’s brain had stopped trailing after the war tactics for the past few weeks, but he was, after all, the General of the Republic. His gear started spinning, taking their options and examining each, searching for the best strategy they could use.

Then Nezha shook his head.

He was getting paranoid. This wasn’t a war. This was a harmless game. They weren’t out to kill each other in this world. He could relax. He didn’t need to be tensed up. There was no life threatening situation. This was not a war.

He slowly let out a breath, forcing his heart to slow down its fast beating and his muscles to ease.

His eyes met Rin’s as they both heard their footsteps getting close. He felt the spark again, even in this made-up battlefield situation, the thrill that went through his body when they had fought back to back, first against the Mugenese, then against the Militia. At that moment, they were thinking the same thing.

They had to take offense, turn the situation into their upper hand.

"Okay," she said breathless from the running, squeezing his arm. "We go in together. Ready?"

"Toge—" he started.

That was the moment Venka's paint splashed squarely on his stomach.

Normally, that couldn't have happened. If he were in his full mode of war, battling for his life and instincts heightened, he would've blocked the blow before he even turned.

But this wasn't a battlefield. This was a normal ground where four college students were messing around.

The impact of Venka's aim startled Nezha, staggering him back onto Rin, who in turn, lost her balance and they fell on the floor with a crash.

"Bitch!" Venka cried gleefully. 

Kitay appeared out of nowhere and was instantly spraying his own on Rin. Rin swore, pushed herself back up and started firing back.

"I should've known better than to trust you!" Rin shouted at Nezha as she dodged Kitay.

Nezha, still stumbled on the ground, looked around his scene, his three friends covered in paint, fighting to keep their laughs off their faces as they continued to spray each other. Paint splashed upon their clothes, vibrant different colors spreading all over the place like the shrieks of their screams. Not blood. No swords. No knives. 

Then Nezha started to laugh.

He had forgotten the last time he'd truly laughed, the pure joy of utter happiness, laughing because everything was funny, carefree, and fucking  _ light _ .

It was delicious. It was glorious. It felt better than anything he’d ever tasted in his life.

He started to laugh, and he wished this moment would never, ever end.

* * *

It started like this.

With an empty threat.

“I,” Rin scowled as she stuffed her essay in her bag. “will fucking kill you.”

Nezha smirked. “Disappointed being second or something?”

She whirled and pushed him on the chest. 

“I will _ beat your ass _ on the next assignment, I assure you,” she hissed. “I didn’t come here to be beaten by your privilege ass.”

“I think you just did.”

“Whoa!” Kitay came out of nowhere to hold Rin’s arm back that swung toward Nezha. “I thought we were all done with the fights?”

“Apparently someone couldn’t hold their temper.” Nezha couldn’t help but keep on throwing a jab in. Who could blame him anyways? He’d missed it, their back and forth banter that lacked any serious atmosphere. So much more than he’d let himself admit.

“Fuck you.”

Nezha raised a brow.

“Wipe that smile off your face.”

“What she said,” Venka appeared to link her arm around Rin’s.

Nezha groaned. “Not you betraying me.”

Venka casually gave him a finger and pulled Rin. "Come on, we don't have time to tolerate these boys."

Rin's glare was pointed, but she pulled Kitay along. He shot Nezha an apologetic look before following her.

It was innocent, it was nothing, it was fucking minor compared to what they'd really gone through in Nikan, but Nezha nevertheless felt the pang of loneliness at the three of them going before him. It sent him tumbling back into the memory of avoiding his gaze as they escaped Arlong.

Nezha remembered that for Rin, Sinegard had been everything. He hadn't really grasped the scope of it, not even after her answer on the boat on the worst night of his life. He always had one thing Rin never had: power and privilege given at birth.

A twist of regret for Rin, the Rin from Nikan went through Nezha's stomach.

It wasn't his doing, not really. All the work. Assignments. They were by whatever the fuck had placed him here. The god. The Pantheon. He didn't know. Maybe Nezha should be scared that this life was basically controlled by the unknowable force, but it was helping him go through, and how was he to blame for that?

"Rin, listen—" he ran and pulled her arm back. She shook it off, turning.

"What?" she snapped.

“Talk to me.”

Kitay gave him a strange look. Venka stared at him, then looked at Rin, cocking her head as if asking a question. 

After a split second, Rin nodded at them, and they walked away, leaving him and Rin alone.

“Well? Talk.”

He bit his lip, choosing his words carefully.

“If you would like, and wouldn’t mind, we can help each other out. With the work.”

Whatever she expected, this wasn’t it. Nezha caught her incredulous expression before she tried to mask it off. 

"Maybe I am wise enough not to team up with you for the second time."

Laugh unwittingly escaped Nezha. “Okay, we failed at paintball. The assignment though? Do you think we can do that together?"

"How can I trust you?"

_ You can't, _ he almost said.

But no. That was another world.

"If I fuck up your work, mine will get fucked too so I don't see why I would even try to."

In another world, he wasn’t a stuck up bitch who tried to undermine a girl from the South. In another world, they trained together, and helped each other through the tough years of Sinegard. In another world, they didn’t need war to bring them together.

In another world, he was asking her exactly this.

“Come on, study with me and we’ll be unstoppable.”

She was thinking about it. Contemplating it. Nezha knew she was otherwise she already would’ve told him to fuck off. 

Rin was still fighting to keep a scowl on her face, but he saw a twist of a smile threatening to poke out from her lips and his heart swelled.

“Deal,” she said, seeming to be grudgingly. “But the next time you leave me to dust, I’m killing you.”

* * *

  
  


It started like this.

With droplets of water sitting on the window pane.

He tried controlling the water.

If everything else from his world had stripped away from him, did the power strip from him too?

Nezha held his breath as he reached over and willed the water to rise. It’d become as natural as breathing in recent months, water simply an extension of his limb, bowing under his will and serving under his command. 

No god whispered in his head. No dragon’s power slithered beneath him. 

The water did not move.

When he was alone, he drew his knife, the only remnant from Nikan he seemed to have retained, avoided the blood on the blade, and slightly nicked his wrist with the tip.

The blood formed and swelled and dropped. The cut didn’t close.

Nezha’s breathing quickened. His heart started beating a bit too fast, as if it was reading his thoughts and was racing its possibly short remaining life before it stopped.

He could die here. And nothing could stop him.

He could get his only wish.

He didn’t need Rin.

He closed his eyes, felt the cold steel on his skin, and the images of Rin, Kitay and Venka swirled through the dark and he dropped his knife with a clatter. The sound echoed against his ringing ears.

In the end, Rin was right. He was a coward. 

He couldn’t bring the knife down on himself here.

_ Fool _ , he thought.  _ You know what awaits if you don’t. _

But here. Here was different. Here was painless. Here was free of burden. Here was something worth living for.

Here was somewhere maybe, where he didn’t wish to die, the first time since Rin had almost killed him in Sinegard.

* * *

It started like this.

With a question that held no weight.

"If you could change one thing about the world, what would it be?"

Kitay was the first to answer the question. "The gap between the rich and poor."

"Righteous man," Venka drawled as she sipped the wine, licking the red stain off her lips.

Nezha's question wasn't born out of blue. He was almost in awe how the power of the world was so far away from their grasps. The alcohol slipped the question past his tongue, when he normally would’ve kept it within his thoughts.

"Proper education for all kids," Rin slapped Kitay's hands that tried to steal the last piece of chocolate away and popped it in her mouth. Kitay yelped in protest. 

“Burn down all men.”

Kitay kicked Venka under the table but the wine interfering his senses, misjudged the distance, almost stumbled off his chair before Rin grabbed his arm.

“I’ll make you an exception,” Venka said, stifling her laugh.

“Fuck Nezha.”

“Fuck Nezha,” Rin agreed.

Nezha aimed a kick at her. She lifted her legs away as if she’d been expecting it, smirking. 

Rin gesticulated at nothing in the air. “My world would be glorious. Equal rights and equal opportunities. I’ll have Kitay, he can do anything.”

“You mean, I do all the work for you and you take all the glory?”

“Yes.”

“Just checking.”

Nezha stared at her, listening to her talk, wondering if she had the slightest idea how much power she was capable of.

"What about you, Nezha?"

Nezha gazed at his friends, his view slightly disjointed by the haze of the alcohol.

"I don't know, right now seems pretty nice enough."

  
  


* * *

Nezha was  _ happy _ .

In his deepest corners of his mind, he knew something was wrong. He couldn't stay here forever.

But he so wanted to ignore that. Just one more.

It was like getting one more glass of drink. Just one more even though his guts knew he should stop. One more shot of Venka's grinning smile. One more shot of Kitay's furrowed eyebrows over his homework. One more shot of Rin's sharp sound of laugh, the same as ever the way he loved. One more shot of Rin tangled up in Kitay's arms, both of them fallen asleep into exhaustion after tests. One more shot of Rin and Venka flinging their crumpled up essays at each other, dodging and falling into silent laughers at the library. One more shot of all of them sitting at the stone steps, lazily exchanging a can of beer. Just one more and he'll stop. Just one more.

Just one more until it might kill him, until he was so overwhelmed he couldn't get out even if he wanted to.

_ But _ , he thought sluggishly as Rin, as drunk as him under the moonlight, the four of them lying within the chilly night wind, pulled him closer and laughed into his arms,  _ what if I never want to? _

Death had always been an escape for him. Why not a slow, agonizing one as long as he was happy?

* * *

  
  


It started like this.

The past creeping up on him like a shadow.

In his dreams, he went back to Speer.

He knew it was a dream. Maybe that was a bad sign. Nikan had become a distant dream and this alternative reality had become his present.

Maybe he didn’t fucking care.

But he saw Rin―and fuck.

She shined a thousand times brighter than the Rin he’d hung out with for months, because she was his Rin, the one he truly met and knew. The other Rin was for the other Nezha, and she deserved that boy, and not a broken one with blood on his hands.

His Rin promptly approached and slapped him.

“What the  _ fuck _ ?”

“What the  _ fuck _ , Yin Nezha?” Rin was angry. She was  _ fuming _ . Nezha, despite his confusion, was almost glad to see her mad. This felt normal. This felt like his life. It was like taking a gasp of fresh air after drowning for years.

“Are you seriously frolicking around while me and Kitay are rotting in time?”

Nezha flinched.

“Do you mean―”

“This is a dream. Wake. Up.”

“How?” he said. “How do I wake up?”

“You know how.”

And perhaps he did, only that he’d never formed words around his suspicion.

“Can you kill me?”

Nezha stared.

“Can you kill me?”

“No,” he whispered. “Not again.”

“You never killed me. I did.”

He snapped. 

“You wrapped my hand around my blade,” he hissed. “You  _ forced  _ me to.” 

“And you  _ had  _ to,” Rin shot back. “I had to be stopped, and if you cared about Nikan at all, you should’ve. If you cared about Nikan at all, you had to kill me.”

Nezha looked away. It hurt to see her.

"You didn't have a problem choking me to death before, so why hesitate now?"

_ That's different, _ he almost said.

Did she really think killing her in the middle of an inevitable war and killing her  _ now _ was the same? He had to, it was either her or him, and he couldn’t die. Shouldn’t die. He was the last man standing in the Republic. He had his people. He had half of Nikara upon his shoulders. He stood, or the Hesperians fell on all of them.

But Rin had won. He no longer had to kill her. He’d lost, but the war wasn’t over. He’d known he still had a chance, but he’d also thought the option of killing her had left his hands. Nezha simply didn’t ever imagine it’d come down to the chaos that happened in Speer.

She had won, so why did she have to go and destroy everything again? Why did she have to wreck the world?

Why did she have to leave him alone?

“You hate me,” she said. “I understand.”

A weird choke, half laugh, half sob escaped his throat. “You have no idea.”

An odd expression flickered across her face, but Nezha was sure he'd imagined it. After all, this was too, a dream.

He'd been living in dreams for too long that he was starting to forget what was real.

* * *

“I was thinking of staying at Kitay’s for a while, and then we can all go somewhere, I know Venka’s got that summer internship and Kitay’s probably going to spend most of his vacation pouring over thesis, but we still can squeeze in time for a week worth of trip?”

Rin’s face was excited, an enthusiastic way he had never seen before. The closest he could recall was when they had been drinking at the top of the tower back in Arlong. The war won. The four of them together. No immediate threat against their lives. Just sorghum wine tossed back and forth. 

He’d been the one to break that expression off her face, and he had to break it off now too.

When Nezha stood frozen, Rin stilled and turned, her face half hidden in shadows against the sun, yet he could almost hear her smile.

"What?" She said. 

Nezha wished this life was his.

"I should go."

A smile faltered from her face. "What?"

"I shouldn't stay here."

"You've been acting so shitty and fucked up lately, do you know that?" Rin snapped.

He knew that. 

How could he not act so shitty and fucked up when he was trying to accept he needed to kill her?

Again?

Rin seemed to be close to punching him. He wished she would. It had been so much easier trying to kill her when she was trying to kill him. It had constantly reminded him that they were on different sides, and there was no other way.

It had to end his way, and Rin's constant resilience and fight reminded him that there was no compromise. 

This world, however, seemed full of infinite possibilities.

He looked away. “I’m sorry,” he said though he was sure she didn’t know what he was apologizing for. “I just....”

“What? Spit it out.”

When he stood silent, Rin’s expression turned cold. “Fine,” she said coolly. “Don’t bother with me. I guess that’s what you wanted?”

“Rin, no―“

“I don’t know why I’m still talking to you, I just  _ can’t  _ with you.” 

He was losing her. What was the point if he was going to lose her every time, every chance?

Unexpected anger surged in him, unreasonable yet ricocheting. He hated her for leaving him. He hated her for this utter madness he was put under. He hated that he knew everything, and she knew nothing. He owed her no explanation. She deserved no explanation.

Nezha turned his face as coldly as he could, the way he always had when they were kids, pretending to be soldiers in the school yard. “I’ll leave, then.”

Rin groaned. "Nezha just…"

As he turned to go, he felt her grab his sleeve and pull. 

"Please," she said. "Stay."

A memory prickled at the edge of his vision and he blinked. 

Rin met his eyes and held.

He saw the same anger reflected in them, the animosity they couldn’t help but harbor for each other. But hatred had never been the sole option for them.

Nezha felt panic closing in with the bridge of his answer. It seemed he was only able to betray Rin, one way or another. He couldn’t have her and not betray her. Either way, this Rin or his Rin, he had to let one down.

In the end, he was weak.

Just one more shot.

"Okay," he said.

A smile he got in response felt like a stab on the stomach.

* * *

  
  


He started having nightmares.

It was Speer, but different each time yet always ended the same way.

He would snatch his knife away from Rin’s hand. He would overpower the Phoenix and retain her on the ground. He would manage to knock her unconscious. 

But no matter what he did, his hand always found its way to his knife which always found its way through her heart.

Her death. Quickly followed by Kitay's.

But no, it wasn’t a dream. Every time Nezha woke up, there was no brief euphoria or relief that the awful things inside his head weren't real and that by waking up, he was leaving them behind. By waking up, he was simply dreaming again.

Because he knew it happened.

He knew he had to  _ enable _ it to happen.

It had to end.

He had to go.

* * *

  
  


It started like this.

A knife. A kiss.

For the second time in his life, he met up with Rin with a knife hidden behind his back. The brick walls pressed against his back, the chill and the feel of the blade prominently running up his spine.

The sky glittered dark, and yet when Nezha looked up he couldn’t see the stars. The nights at Arlong were always filled with stars. The night he first pushed the blade on her back had stars. He could clearly remember them reflected on the water, dancing along with Rin’s flame. What had this world done to make them run away? 

Rin always shined brighter and fiercer than others, even here without the fire. It was the sheer will-power and determination that radiated off the body. The more you knew her, the more you noticed until it was impossible to ignore.

She demanded every bit of his attention, even though she never seemed to have noticed it.

Rin approached him and his heart ached.

"What in the world would you need me now for?"

_ When had I ever  _ not _ needed you? _

Nezha studied her face, carefully weighing his options and words, knowing this was another chance yet the last chance he would ever have.

"Can I ask you something?"

She shrugged. "Sure."

"Do you think we can ever stop fighting?"

Rin frowned. "Is it about the other day? If so, that's stupid, we fight all the time."

"Do you ever wonder… what would it be like if we were on the same side? All the time?

"What's this all about Yin Nezha?"

"What if we never have to fight? Disagree? What if we instead of going against each other, we fight  _ with _ each other?" He stared at her, and added as an afterthought: "Always."

He was sure he saw a sparkle of interest in her eyes, and Rin seemed thoughtful the way she never had been. 

"Do you think we can?"

"Do  _ you _ ?"

“I guess we won’t know unless we try.” 

"Can we try?"

"Do you want to?"

"Yes." He said simply. 

Because it was true. He wanted to try. If they could.

“This could go wrong,” she said cautiously. “This could go horribly wrong.”

_ You have no idea. _

“Like how?”

Rin folded her arms. “Oh, I don’t know. Most of the time I hate you. That doesn’t really get along well with the ‘never fight’ part I assume.”

“What about the rest of the time then?”

Rin said nothing.

“Please Rin, I don’t want to go on forever like this.”

One minute of peace was all he could get, and he selfishly wanted it more than anything.

“And if we fail?”

“Then we’d know we’ve tried.”  _ For the second time. _ “Doesn’t that count for something?”

Ever since the day at the Grotto, Nezha had always felt like drowning. His only gulps of air had been when Rin had almost killed him. This was almost as good as then. As he saw Rin’s mind coming up with the answer, Nezha felt the brink of the surface, the air so close to breathe in.

"Well, in that case," she said, drawing herself at full height even though she only came up to his chin. "You found yourself a lifelong ally. I hope I don't regret this."

"Truce?"

Rin's grin seemed to pull out of her reluctantly but widely. "Truce."

The surface broke, and the air was brief but sweet.

The knowledge of the possibility of all of them together, just like under the stars back in Arlong, holding hands, wasn't going to be enough but for Nezha, it had to be.

Rin's expression changed when she met his eyes, and he wondered if she knew what was coming. 

“I wouldn’t mind if you kiss me,” Rin said, a half smile tugging on the corner of her lips. 

And because he needed a bit of her courage for this, maybe because he realized that this might be the truly last time he would ever see her, maybe because he was simply aching to do so for months and years now, he couldn’t bring himself to hold back.

A kiss. Bare breath against his lips.

Merely a glimpse of what could’ve been.

But he owed it to her, and he needed to get the fuck out of this dream otherwise he would get drunk in this fake fantasy.

“You’re not real,” he breathed against her mouth.

Nezha pulled the blade from his back, and stepped back, wrenching himself away from her.

“You’re not real,” he choked.

Oh god.

“You’re not real.”

Rin merely stared up at him, and she didn’t even take up her fighting stance. 

His Rin would never.

“You’re not real.”

He raised his knife, and it was all so the same and it felt so real.

“You’re not real.”

She reached over and traced her fingers along his face, tracing exactly the place where his scars should’ve been.

“You’re not real.”

"Nezha," she whispered.

But this was cowardly, selfishly harder because this time Rin’s hand didn’t guide the knife to her chest.

This was so much harder because she wasn't even fighting back. 

This had to be his doing. He had to prove he had the will to actually save Nikan from its depths. Whatever some sick force had brought him here, this was the only answer to it.

He wasn’t able to kill Rin by himself, yet fate had caught up to him anyway.

“You’re not real.”

Kitay was wrong. He didn’t get one life. He got two. Yet he managed to ruin Rin both times.

“You’re not real.”

His body shook. He had killed so many, took so many innocent lives that he shouldn't feel bad about killing a monster who tried to ruin everything and everyone in his country.

"You're not real."

God he was wrong. He shouldn't have asked her that. He shouldn't have known that somewhere, they could be together. He was instantly regretting everything he'd said and done, the questions he'd asked, the answers he'd gotten and the taste of her lips on his mouth. He shouldn't have. He shouldn't have. They all made everything so real and full of possibilities, when Nezha knew he could never, ever have them.

"You're not real."

He felt his hand slacken, but there was no Rin, no brave, reckless, monster-like Rin to grip it for him so he adjusted the grip around the knife and slammed it into Rin’s chest.

* * *

  
  


Nezha opened his eyes.

Gone were the walls and the night sky and the hidden stars and the whiff of peace. Came the smell of the sea around Speer, the burnt smell of smoke that still radiated off the small body he held in his arms, the feel of her blood in his hands, and the burden of his choices on his shoulders. Kitay collapsed as Rin fell, as the two always moved together, laughed together, fought together, and now died together as well.

All those times he had tried to kill her, during the battlefields and in the grotto, he never truly believed he could. Rin was impossible to kill, and so he would die trying.

The weight of her body brought him to the ground with her, and all he wanted to do was howl.

It ended like this.

With a knife to her chest.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading! Comments and everything are much appreciated :)


End file.
